Neglected No Longer
by ScribeOfRED
Summary: Maintaining the status quo is easier than risking it all.


John has a bad habit of ignoring what he needs. Everything from basic human necessities to companionship—he pushes them aside again and again, _just a bit longer, I_ _'ll be done with this soon_. He should know better, he witnesses day in and day out the fragility of human life. He's seen it with his own eyes, first Mom, then Gordon, and most recently Dad. No one can predict the next person death will attempt to sink his teeth into, and John keeps brushing him aside, fingers swiping through holograms to thwart him a bit longer as easily as they terminate conversations he needs to have and relationships he knows he should cultivate, but he'll worry about them later.

And then _Thunderbird S_ crashes, shot down over the hostile Sayan Mountains, and he decides that perhaps there are some needs he can't ignore any longer.

Food, water, rest—those needs can be and are pushed aside. He pours everything he has, all his energy and resources, into locating _Thunderbird S_ and, more important, her pilot. It takes hours to pinpoint the wreckage, and hours more to tear his way through enough bureaucratic red tape to obtain safe flight passage for _Thunderbird Two_. He refuses to leave the commsphere until Virgil shares visual proof that Kayo's secure in _Thunderbird Two_ 's medical bay, unconscious but still alive.

For now.

"Come home, John," Virgil says, unnecessarily, because John's already swinging his body around to drop through the short airlock connecting sphere to ring. Gravity and fatigue seize him with equal force once his feet hit fused silica, combine their efforts to drag him nearly to his knees. It's a struggle to complete the required checklist, an imperative before he can step foot in the elevator, but the need to return to Earth, to see her for himself, perhaps for the last time, is a need that cannot be ignored. Not this time.

Atmospheric burn is hell, but even when the elevator pod's vibrating so hard he's sure the whole thing is about to destabilize on an atomic level and vaporize himself along with it, he's still thinking about her. He could have lost her today—no, wait. Yesterday. Might still lose her. But he _should_ have been able to protect her, should have identified the missiles as a threat sooner, should have ordered her to change her flight path instead of letting her maintain course over a known military hot spot, should have told her all the things he's wanted to say but never found the time.

He's never _needed_ to find time—not for her—and now it might be too late.

One more chance, he begs silently as the elevator shudders and jolts and then settles onto its dock. One more chance. That's all he needs—and this time he has no intention of squandering it.

Gordon's waiting on the staircase with arms folded. John squares his shoulders and raises his chin, defiant against both the Earth's attempts to crush him into submission and the equally powerful force of nature that is Gordon's personality. He really, really does not want to deal with Gordon and his histrionics right now.

But Gordon surprises him, in the way Gordon always does. "She's hurt but going to pull through," is all he says, serious but not doom-and-gloom dire, and he ducks under John's arm when the framework of stress that's been holding him up for too many hours crumbles away, leaving him weak and dizzy and aware of his humanity once more.

"I need to see her." It's the only thought circling through his pounding head, and he does his best to keep up with the pace Gordon sets towards the infirmary.

The shift in atmospheric pressure catches up with him all at once, blurring his vision and pinning his tongue to the bottom of his mouth with its own weight, and he's glad for Gordon's steady presence next to him, even though it isn't the presence he craves. And yet he stops dead in front of the door, rigid with unwanted, unneeded, but inescapable uncertainty.

This is real. He is here, on Earth, standing on one side the infirmary door because she's on the other side. She's on the other side because _he_ put her there. Is she waiting for him? Does she even want to see him? Has he made an error so grave it's irreparable?

He turns to Gordon with no idea what he wants to say or what he's looking for. Something, he needs something, he needs—he needs—

Gordon to press his glasses into his hand and say, "She's woken up and asked for you—more than once."

And suddenly the door between them seems a trivial thing. It's easy to walk beyond and settle in the empty chair next to her bed, because he knows what he needs and he's done ignoring her.


End file.
